Can The Congress Be Reinvented?

Here's a trick question. Is it possible for the Congress Party to reinvent itself without disturbing the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty? Because if the reinvention has to take place it must be within the parameters of family rule. As the CWC on Monday demonstrated, Congressmen and Congresswomen will not countenance even the thought of Rahul or Sonia stepping down. I have long argued that if one is a Congress supporter, one must learn to accept dynastic rule. It is appalling, but it is a reality.

The matter of family indispensability has become complicated currently since dynasties too have a responsibility, especially a dynasty not imposed by military or civilian dictatorship. And that responsibility is to deliver. Indira Gandhi did, so too did Sonia in 2009 and 2014. However, the defeat suffered by the party on May 16 is of a magnitude and scale which should leave even Sonia squirming.

In any other party in the free world, there would have been a spate of resignations. Predictably, after a few days of talk in the media, and "party sources", the issue has gone cold. Today, the 10 Janpath dispensation may be slightly weakened but it is very much in control, and likely to stay in control.

So, back to my trick question: Can the party be reinvented? It is hardly a secret that Congresswallahs of all vintage and stature "crawl" in front of the Gandhis. Journalists have had the unhappy opportunity of watching how party leaders humiliate themselves in front of Sonia and Rahul.

Their back is seldom straight. The Gandhis may occasionally listen to the stalwarts and sometimes give them a long rope, but once Sonia or Rahul have spoken, all discussion on the subject ceases. The "last word" has been uttered. This is sometimes called the "glue" and it has limited uses. I have heard BJP leaders often lament the absence of "glue" in their party leading to a cacophony of voices speaking on a single issue. However, my topic is the reinvention of the Congress party, not the BJP.

One way of energising and reviving the party is to let a thousand flowers bloom. For Rahul to lock himself away in Tughlaq Lane and work in secrecy relying on the expertise of four or five of his acolytes is a recipe for disaster. The one occasion I met Rahul Gandhi some months ago I advised him to seek out the widest possible opinion in and out of the party. He was surrounded by a few underlings who seldom spoke, and when they did, it was only to endorse what the boss was saying. For Congress leaders entry into Rahul's war-room is by invitation only.

Not just in journalism, but in politics, honest debate and dissent are the lifeblood of the profession — a way of arriving at the truth. Sonia and Rahul need to listen. And they must be prepared to be overruled without feeling a coup d'etat is in the offing. The top leadership must encourage party leaders to express their views candidly, especially those at variance with the thinking at 10 Janpath. Presently, instead of debate, we have a Sonia/ Rahul echo chamber.

How many strategy sessions with senior leaders were held by Rahul to formulate the party's election campaign? Did anyone in the party tell Rahul that corruption as an issue sits badly on his lips? Was the usefulness of Rahul using the family name and emphasising family sacrifices thrashed out? Were the implications of 100 million new voters entering the register fully discussed? A campaign planned in secrecy and in stealth, besides being an insult, is counterproductive for a 127-year-old party.

The "old guard" may be on walking sticks but some of them understand India from the ground. Most do not know how to use a computer so they cannot key in data and emerge with the right answers. Sure, many may have vested interests. However, a shrewd leader knows how to tap experience and bin the rest.

My reinvention formula has about a 50% chance of success because it is based on the assumption that the Gandhis cannot be touched. This poses severe limitations on creating a blueprint. Some leaders, anyway, prefer to rely on the time-tested method: oppositions don't win elections, governments lose them.

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The Root Cause of the HISTORIC DEFEAT OF CON Party in 2014 elections is the word called "SONIANOMICS"..

The people of this country want real development, real growth and real investment and real jobs.. not doles and unrealizable rights and meaningless laws like RTE, MNREGA and FSB..

Thus, India - 80% of Indians have roundly rejected SONIANOMICS..

The message for CONgress is - try to invent a new economic theory -which can be left of center, anti BJP/Anti Modinomics but at same time does not follow the failed SONIANOMICs path..

Can they? Will they? I doubt.. even the most ardent supporters of CON party - over here, over the leftist media (guhas and tehelkas and Hindu's N Ram) have failed to daigonoze the disease and understand that 2014 is about the rejection of hare brained laws and concepts like MNREGA, RTE etc..

There are many among the young who think Gandhi arrived on the scene rather too early even before India as a unified nation was mature. To say objectively, Gandhi helped the Gandhi -Nehru family more than the nation. No wonder His grandson was rejected in the elections. It is the 2nd rung politicians under congress brand who destroyed all values in politics.

One simple fact not considered seriously by Congressmen is that the "Gandhi" surname has NO meaning now to most voters in India. To an embarrassinlgly large number, and this incudes most of the 'young', the surname is just another herald of a welcome holiday on the 2nd October every year. A few VVIPs in Delhi troop with long and serious faces to Raj Ghat to lay flowers and that is it. They, as well as the rest of the country, hardly need to remember the Mahatma for the rest of the year. As for the present dynasty with the same surname, though it belongs to an entirely different lineage not even remotely connected to the Mahatma, all the mystique, charisma and fondness for the 'Gandhis' stopped gradually after Indira and abruptly after Rajiv. A white streak in the hair or an attempt to look like one's grandfather or grandmother cannot and will not catapult one into the hallowed strata in which the earlier generations of the 'dynasty' were held by the people. The poor crowds, even after assiduous marshalling by Congress workers and aspiring candidates that turned up at Rahul and Sonia's campaign meetins are alone testimony to the faded charisma of the famous surname. Commanding by a mere lifting of the little finger, a la Marie Antoinette, is a thing of the past. The men and women fighting elections on a Congress ticket now know that they can no longer expect the dynasty to pull in votes. Else, the likes of Chidambaram and many others like him would not have shied away from contesting. In the event, they were proved spot on as Sonia's and Rahul's sole appearances in Tamil Nadu poll meetings in Kanyakumari and Ramanathpuram for Congress candidates did not result in wins, the latter even losing his deposit. Congress may still need the "Gandhis" but they cannot expect them to revive the party's fortunes. They may be shocked to learn that they have to do it themselves, with the 'dynasty' as a prop and a 'glue' to keep factions from totally ruining the party.

This is a general remark. Qualitative analysis is INFERIOR to quantitative analysis in economics and leads people astray. This includes the present article. It missed the most important point, the economic balance of a fiat economy ( being different from what is commonly assumed) is what led to economic failure.

NET IMPORT is called FOREIGN DEFICIT = CURRENT ACCOUNT DEFICIT = CAD. The difference (FISCAL DEFICIT - CAD ) feeds the economy. The sum FISCAL DEFICIT+ CAD means NOTHING. Yet the economists keep adding them ( Rajan, Chidambaram and Manmohan Singh ) which kills the economy. FISCAL DEFICIT is vital to the economy. Now you should understand why I say algebra killed the Indian economy. X%GDP DEFICIT will grow India's economy by exactly X%GDP. For example 4.6% GDP DEFICIT will grow the economy by 4.6% GDP, as everybody knows. Manmohan Singh is to be assigned the blame for letting this happen. He was sleeping during his watch.

You need to maximize (FISCAL DEFICIT- CAD) instead of minimizing (FISCAL DEFICIT + CAD). This mistake did congress in. Surely MMS must have known. Rajan and Chidambaram could be brainwashed by the Chicago school. How come they do not understand an accounting identity? All accountants know this and use it in calculating and reporting GDP.

(FISCAL DEFICIT - CAD ) = NET PRIVATE SAVINGS.

At 30% of GDP deficit the economy would grow to 1.3^10 = 13.8 times present GDP in 10 years. Congress is no longer in the picture and perhaps Modi can do this if he gets an economist not brainwashed by the Chicago school, who understands fiat money.

2. The congress did not act swiftly when various scams were exposed. This assured the people of corruption in congress.

In a powerful and moving dialogue between Karna and Kunti, the latter pleads forgiveness for her act of abandoning him soon after he was born for fear of retribution as an unwed mother and for acceptance of her maternal love henceforth as her eldest son. Karna’s honest reply tinged with sadness states that it will not be possible for him to transfer his love for his foster mother who had given him her unstinted love to Kunti whom he now discovers as his biological mother. He says that just as the fallen fruit of the mango tree cannot be once again glued to the tree, it will be impossible for him to be affixed to her. The gravitational pull that brings down the mango cannot be reversed and this scientific truth holds a mirror to the fall that all of us experience at different periods in our lives.
The fall of the Congress is indeed a giant fall. Coming close on the heels of the 50thdeath anniversary of the first Congress Prime Minister of India, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, - a giant among statesmen, a philosopher-king,- the collapse of Congress under the Modi onslaught is pathetic and presently seems irreversible. To imagine that it can be glued once again to the tired and vapid Congress slogans of Garibhi Hatao and Custodianship of Secularism invoke pathos if not derision and ridicule very much like Don Quixote’s tilt at the windmills.
This is the 21st century, a period dominated by the media especially by Cinema and TV and glossy newspapers and newsmagazines. The message is in the medium and it percolates to every nook and corner of the nation. The masses are fed on glamour and style that form the core of all media presentation in the name of entertainment and infotainment. The City is shown as the place to fulfill their romanticized fantasy and desire for a better lifestyle , albeit on a lower rung. This has resulted in the large exodus to the city from the countryside. All the programmes that the Congress had started such as MNREGA and Food Security Bill did provide the rural poor food and some form of employment and wages but the allurement of the city and the dream of living the life seen on the big and small screens could not be satisfied by the appeasement of hunger and offer of physical jobs that were far removed from the reel life.
For Congress time has stood still at the Nehruvian age. It continued to live in a time warp, not noticing the aspirations both of the middle class and that of the new young generation. The first Congress government of Pt. Nehru, showed an aspirational India wanting the fruits of freedom. The next Congress government of Indira continued the Nehruvian socialism to focus on poverty alleviation(Gharibi Hatao) and the Congress of Rajiv Gandhi brought the exhilaration of modernization that was short-lived. But Dr.ManMohan Singh and his retinue of well educated ministers failed to read the yearning of the new India raised on the glamour of showbiz and mobile technology that found expression through the social media. They were completely out of tune with the masses –not because they were not conversant with the new media, but they failed to note that young India was far more media savvy than all their Oxonian and Cambridgian knowledge had equipped them with. Even when indications were given about the strength social media can create during the Anna Hazare Movement and later the Nirbhaya movement, the Congress ministers sat like ostriches burying their heads in files without raising their fingers to twitter or blog. The bitter truth is social media has come to stay with its pretension to ‘a pastiche of knowledgeability that is really a new model of know-nothingness’(Karl taro Greenfield in the New York Times). Social media promotes fake social and political literacy and it has become a pandemic. The BJP was quick to see the advantage of the flipside of social media and harnessed it to its best advantage with its daily litany of Congress- mukht Bharat where Congress stood both for party and corruption. The Congress ostriches did nothing to counter the attack nor used the social media to showcase all their achievements even if they did not fully measure up to the aspirations of the new generation.

So the mango has fallen and it cannot be brought back to the tree. But Nature has an answer for all its fallen fruits. The mango has the seed that has the capability to germinate and sprout. It needs fresh hands to dig the soil, to water it and make it germinate very quickly. Instead of being tied to the old guard with no new slogans, the Congress has to take fresh guard and learn to reach out to people, understand their need and work out strategies that can meet a major part of their aspirations. It will be foolish and even naïve to keep nit picking all that the present government has set out to achieve or take over the role of destructive opposition earlier indulged by the BJP. It will be prudent to be realistic in making promises to people that is void of all empty rhetoric. Congress has to re-invent itself while continuing with the inclusive development that Nerhu’s socialism had envisioned.
It is of utmost importance to educate people. All talk of empowerment of people has no meaning unless people are educated about their duty and about their role in nation building. The old time slogan of public-private partnership is to be re-engineered to people-state partnership that lays emphasis on people’s contribution and cooperation. What has happened to India-as it had happened in Egypt, Libya and Syria, to name a few – is politicians promising people vocal empowerment without providing them mental power and citizenship development. The result has been disastrous as seen in the failure of AAP’s tryst with people’s power. The slogan of the hour should be ‘Duty first, rights next’ .

It is unfortunate that in a moment of euphoria that has brought a man of humble origin to the highest position in government, there has come a tendency to disparage intellectuals and educated classes and claim the superiority and wisdom of mass leaders without bookish and academic education. This bodes ill for the future of the nation as the world is galloping along new technological inventions, sociological transformations, new ideologies and psychological changes. We need a generation of thinkers who can lead the nation to keep pace with an emerging world order. No development is complete without the development of the mind and the spirit.
Can Congress reinvent itself? Can the mango seed sprout again? Can Congress commit itself to accept the fall of the mango only to sprout and grow and yield more and richer fruits? It can if it nurtures young plants and fresh soil without foolishly attempting to fix the fallen fruit to the old tree. The need for Congress to revive and reboot itself is important because it has to be ready to provide people an exhilarating alternative in the years to come when the present euphoria will wane and people’s aspirations seek a new force to prop them up.

Mr.Mehta has objectively analysed. The dynasty leadership surrounded by a set of cotire , is inaccessible to cadres and thus totally disconnected from the reality.Even if the leadership revamp the party , it will be new set of "sycophants" and thier disconnect will continue. If Priyanka takes official role she has to carry the liability of her her husband. Unless the dynasty restores complete inner party democracy the future looks bleak.

Speaking politely does not excuse you for being a servile imbecile willing to swallow made-up history about people you have never met. Better a filthy mouth that speaks against lies than an unethical mind that regurgitates lies, so go take a hike, you pompous twit. Just because you are in england does not make you an englishmen because you "speak politely and have great manners". Have seen enough smug arseholes your kind who have the ethics of a psychopath, and you are no different.